People's Bank of China
39°54′24″N 116°21′14″E / 39.90667°N 116.35389°E
Bank logo | |
Headquarters | Beijing, China |
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Established | December 1, 1948 |
Governor | Zhou Xiaochuan |
Central bank of | People's Republic of China |
Currency | PRC Yuan CNY (ISO 4217) |
Reserves | US$3.201 trillion[1] |
Bank rate | 6.0% |
Interest on reserves | 3.5% |
Preceded by | Central Bank of the Republic of China |
Website | www.pbc.gov.cn |
For other currencies named "Yuan" and their respective central banks, see Chinese Yuan. |
People's Bank of China | |||||||
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Chinese name | |||||||
Simplified Chinese | 中国人民银行 | ||||||
Traditional Chinese | 中國人民銀行 | ||||||
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Alternative Chinese name | |||||||
Simplified Chinese | 人民银行 | ||||||
Traditional Chinese | 人民銀行 | ||||||
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Second alternative Chinese name | |||||||
Chinese | 央行 | ||||||
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Tibetan name | |||||||
Tibetan | ཀྲུང་གོ་མི་དམངས། མི་རྣམས།དངུལ་ཁང་། | ||||||
Zhuang name | |||||||
Zhuang | Cunghgoz Yinzminz Yinzhangz | ||||||
Uyghur name | |||||||
Uyghur | جۇڭگو خەلق بانكا |
The People's Bank of China (PBC or PBOC) is the central bank of the People's Republic of China with the power to control monetary policy and regulate financial institutions in mainland China. The People's Bank of China has the most financial assets of any single public finance institution ever.[2]
History
The bank was established on December 1, 1948, based on the consolidation of the Huabei Bank, the Beihai Bank and the Xibei Farmer Bank. The headquarters was first located in Shijiazhuang, Hebei, and then moved to Beijing in 1949. Between 1949 and 1978 the PBC was the only bank in the People's Republic of China and was responsible for both central banking and commercial banking operations[dubious – discuss].
In the 1980s, as part of economic reform, the commercial banking functions of the PBC were split off into four independent but state-owned banks and in 1983, the State Council promulgated that the PBC would function as the central bank of China. Mr. Chen Yuan was instrumental in modernizing the bank in the early 1990s. Its central bank status was legally confirmed on March 18, 1995 by the 3rd Plenum of the 8th National People's Congress. In 1998, the PBC underwent a major restructuring. All provincial and local branches were abolished, and the PBC opened nine regional branches, whose boundaries did not correspond to local administrative boundaries. In 2003, the Standing Committee of the Tenth National People's Congress approved an amendment law for strengthening the role of PBC in the making and implementation of monetary policy for safeguarding the overall financial stability and provision of financial services.
Although stated in the above section, that the People's Bank of China, (PBoC),[3] is the single largest financial institution in the world, PBoC is in fact the largest central bank at US$3.201 trillion.[4]
Management
The top management of the PBC is composed of the governor and a certain number of deputy governors. The governor of the PBC is appointed into or removed from office by the President of the People's Republic of China. The candidate for the governor of the PBC is nominated by the Premier of the State Council and approved by the National People's Congress. When the National People's Congress is in adjournment, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress sanctions the candidacy for the governor of the PBC. The deputy governors of the PBC are appointed into or removed from office by the Premier of the State Council.
The PBC adopts a governor responsibility system under which the governor supervises the overall work of the PBC while the deputy governors provide assistance to the governor to fulfill his or her responsibility.
The current governor is Zhou Xiaochuan. Other high-ranking deputies include Wang Hongzhang, Hu Xiaolian, Liu Shiyu, Ma Delun, Yi Gang, Du Jinfu, Li Dongrong, Guo Qingping.[5]
Structure
The PBC has established 9 regional branches, one each in Tianjin, Shenyang, Shanghai, Nanjing, Jinan, Wuhan, Guangzhou, Chengdu and Xi'an, 2 operations offices in Beijing and Chongqing, 303 municipal sub-branches and 1809 county-level sub-branches.
It has 6 overseas representative offices (PBC Representative Office for America, PBC Representative Office (London) for Europe, PBC Tokyo Representative Office, PBC Frankfurt Representative Office, PBC Representative Office for Africa, Liaison Office of the PBC in the Caribbean Development Bank).
The PBC consists of 18 functional departments (bureaus) as below:[6]
- General Administration Department
- Legal Affairs Department
- Monetary Policy Department
- Financial Market Department
- Financial Stability Bureau
- Financial Survey and Statistics Department
- Accounting and Treasury Department
- Payment System Department
- Technology Department
- Currency, Gold and Silver Bureau
- State Treasury Bureau
- International Department
- Internal Auditing Department
- Personnel Department
- Research Bureau
- Credit Information System Bureau
- Anti-Money Laundering Bureau (Security Bureau)
- Education Department of the CPC PBC Committee
The following enterprises and institutions are directly under the PBC:[7]
- China Anti-Money Laundering Monitoring and Analysis Center
- PBC Graduate School
- China Financial Publishing House
- Financial News
- China National Clearing Center
- China Banknote Printing and Minting Corporation
- China Gold Coin Incorporation
- China Financial Computerization Corporation
- China Foreign Exchange Trade System
Microfinance
Financial Inclusion
The PBOC is active in promoting financial inclusion policy and a member of the Alliance for Financial Inclusion.[8]
List of Governors
№ | Name | Took office | Left office |
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1 | Nan Hanchen (南汉宸) | October 1949 | October 1954 |
2 | Cao Juru (曹菊如) | October 1954 | October 1964 |
3 | Hu Lijiao (胡立教) | October 1964 | 1966 |
post abolished | |||
4 | Chen Xiyu (陈希愈) | May 1973 | January 1978 |
5 | Li Baohua (李葆华) | January 1978 | April 1982 |
6 | Lü Peijian (吕培俭) | April 1982 | March 1985 |
7 | Chen Muhua (陈慕华) | March 1985 | April 1988 |
8 | Li Guixian | April 1988 | July 1993 |
9 | Zhu Rongji | July 1993 | June 1995 |
10 | Dai Xianglong | June 1995 | December 2002 |
11 | Zhou Xiaochuan | December 2002 | Incumbent |
Interest rates
Previously, interest rates set by the bank were always divisible by nine, instead of by 25 as in the rest of the world.[9][10] However, it no longer applies, since the central bank started increasing the rates by 0.25 percentage points at a time.
The most recent rate hike was on 6 July 2011, taking benchmark 1-year rates up by 25 basis points to 6.56% while deposit rates were also hiked by 25 basis points to 3.5%.
See also
- China Banknote Printing and Minting Corporation
- Renminbi
- Bank of China, state owned commercial bank
- Hong Kong Monetary Authority
- Monetary Authority of Macao
- Central Bank of the Republic of China (Taiwan), the central bank of the Republic of China
References
- ^ Rapoza, Kenneth (October 15, 2011). "China's Cash Position Swells To Record High". BEIJING: Forbes. Retrieved October 22, 2010.
- ^ http://web.archive.org/web/20090302091204/http://www.thetimes.co.za/Careers/Article.aspx?id=817985
- ^ Data on China's Foreign Currency Reserve Holdings and how that has changed with increases in the US Money Supply, John Lott, et. al., John Lott's Website, retrieved 28 Dec 2011; http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/2010/11/data-on-chinas-foreign-currency-reserve.html
- ^ "China's Cash Position Swells To Record High", Investing, Forbes, Kenneth Rapoza al., 15 Oct 2011, retrieved 28 Dec 2011; http://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2011/10/15/chinas-cash-position-swells-to-record-high/
- ^ 中国人民银行
- ^ The People's Bank of China. "Management and Organizational Structure". Retrieved May 29, 2012.
- ^ The People's Bank of China. "Enterprises and Institutions directly under the PBC". Retrieved May 29, 2012.
- ^ "AFI members". AFI Global. October 10, 2011. Retrieved February 23, 2012.
- ^ "Calendar, Abacus Help Determine Size of Chinese Rate Increases". Bloomberg. May 18, 2007.
- ^ Viewpoint: The "divisible by nine" rule